This is the Home of the Spiritual Dryness Scale (SDS) which was developed in 2011 by Arndt Büssing and was used first in the German Pastoral Ministry Study.

Spiritual dryness describes feelings that God is distant, that one’s prayers go unanswered, to be ‘spiritually empty’ or not being able to give any more (both in terms of a spiritual exhaustion), and finally feelings of being abandoned by God. These phases are much more a process of loss or even ‘separation’ from God and are thus in contrast to St. John of the Cross´ “Dark Night of the Soul” which is a process to become closer to God in terms of an ‘attraction’.

Here you will find background information about the Spiritual Dryness Scale to measure the frequency of such feelings, about current projects, references citing the scale, and a link to send an email in case you have interest to use the instrument or would like to collaborate.